


second to death

by orphan_account



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Anxiety, Anxiety-induced vomiting, Canon Divergence, Coronavirus mention, Established Relationship, Gratuitous Manga Terminology, I'm Sorry, M/M, Minor NSFW, Multi, Public Speaking, Timeskip Akaashi Keiji, editor akaashi, no I’m not, overworked and underpaid manga editor Akaashi Keiji, this is mostly propaganda against scanlation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-16
Updated: 2020-03-16
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:48:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,812
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23174953
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Did you know that the second biggest phobia besides death is public speaking?Well, now you do.Friends of mine know I’ve had an on/off relationship with Haikyuu fics for years. We know so little about their lives outside of volleyball that it’s really hard to write about without giving up in frustration and wishing there was more to offer instead of projecting ourselves onto the boys and girls we love over and over again.When Furudate made Akaashi an editor, that changed.I hope you enjoy, and also check out this fanart:https://twitter.com/yzhn_k/status/1221715017218711552?s=21
Relationships: Akaashi Keiji/Bokuto Koutarou, Kozume Kenma/Kuroo Tetsurou
Kudos: 16





	second to death

**Author's Note:**

> Did you know that the second biggest phobia besides death is public speaking?
> 
> Well, now you do. 
> 
> Friends of mine know I’ve had an on/off relationship with Haikyuu fics for years. We know so little about their lives outside of volleyball that it’s really hard to write about without giving up in frustration and wishing there was more to offer instead of projecting ourselves onto the boys and girls we love over and over again.
> 
> When Furudate made Akaashi an editor, that changed. 
> 
> I hope you enjoy, and also check out this fanart:  
> https://twitter.com/yzhn_k/status/1221715017218711552?s=21

Keiji calls Tetsurou for the third time in one week, staring at his haphazard array of paperwork. He puts Tetsurou on speaker in the event that Koutarou comes home early, though with public gatherings being what they are, that’s wishful thinking.

Tetsurou answers on the second ring: “Stop procrastinating and put that sociopath out of a job.”

“Unfortunately, Tetsurou-san, this call doesn’t concern him.”

Most of their calls as of late have concerned one dreaded mangaka to whom Keiji’s company granted him the unprecedented privilege of editing. 

Rather than creating his “shockingly timely, irreverent, madcap”* panels for the most popular publication in the shounen industry, this mangaka prided himself in explaining to Keiji in morbid, exacting detail how he might do away with other rising stars in the shounen manga world.

Thanks to him, on the rare occasions Keiji sleeps in his bed and not at his desk, he dreams of decaying corpses, rotting lungs and the kind of demented, broken laughter hollowed out of men who grasp true horror before they can comprehend it.

He fights that off enough in his moments of quiet. Now, Keiji can harness his energy around something more productive.

“You’re good at public speaking, Tetsurou-san.”

There’s a pause in which Keiji hears some self-deprecating laughter, followed by an aside from Kenma he can’t parse through the phone; Tetsurou doesn’t bother repeating it, but Keiji imagines Tetsurou fondly scrubbing his hand through Kenma’s static dumpling hair before readjusting his position under the warmth of their kotatsu.

Tetsurou says, “Where is this coming from?”

Keiji hears the familiar trill of boss battle music from Kenma’s console and, smiling to himself, wishes he didn’t yearn for the company of friends half as much as he does now. 

He waves one hand over his phone, staring at his lockscreen of himself and Koutarou as he says, “I’m scheduled to give a speech on the negative impacts of scanlation in the manga industry.”

This from Kenma: “Oh, cool. Should handle that problem yesterday.”

“Well,” and here Keiji coughs heavily into his left hand, his right hand shaking, “I’m angrier than you. The issue here is every time I give speeches, I throw up.”

Neither Tetsurou nor Kenma had attended Fukuroudani’s Sports Day Festival during Keiji’s second year, but Koutarou had summarized the horror of watching Keiji stand on a platform, surrounded by adoring supporters, all of them waiting for him to thank his team for leading him through the baton race, only for Keiji to throw up Koutarou’s shared bento all over his newly bought running shoes.

After that fruitless endeavour, the problem worsened; next came Keiji’s speech on behalf of the student council treasury, where he’d thrown up on his scattered notecards on which he’d written the finer points. Then came Fukuroudani’s team dinner with coaches old and new, the one instance during which Keiji had managed to locate the bathroom in time with Akinori’s help.

At the time,Keiji hadn’t understood why he, of all people, had been chosen to thank the coaches for their help in cultivating Fukuroudani’s prowess, determination and excellence in volleyball. 

Akinori’s takeaway had been Keiji was less likely to run from the table mid sentence in pursuit of a friend, like Koutarou, and less likely to get bored and cut himself off, as Akinori often did during group project presentations.

All of this to say those in the know envisioned Keiji as someone measured in his speech, someone who chose his words with great care and someone who wrote well enough to wind up in prestigious literary publications by the time his first year of high school was up.

What was the point of harbouring his gifts if they betrayed him in the end?

Tetsurou says, “I’m assuming you’ve heard of the trick where you imagine an audience naked.”

Sighing, Keiji leans back in his swivel chair. What he wouldn’t give for his friends to understand the terrible power of assumptions.  _He assumes I’m in need of less help than is necessary. It’s not even worth clarifying._

“Thank you for your invaluable contribution,Tetsurou-san. I’ll see you in several months.”

He hears a plaintive request to hold the line, but then he hangs up, crushing the heels of his palms into his eyes.

The next day, Keiji goes about his morning routine, in the same underslept delirium he’s grown acquainted with over the past two years.

Koutarou’s gone to work already, so says the note pinned under a plate of leftover omurice on top of Keiji’s amassed papers. In the haze of his thoughts, Keiji can almost remember the warmth of Koutarou’s kiss on top of his head the night before.

He showers with what little energy he possesses, brushes his teeth and burrows into his work clothes that he’s aired out on the apartment’s balcony with the other laundry. The sound of the bicycle wheels whistling down the sidewalk and taxis purring up residential avenues provide the soundtrack of what might transpire as an uneventful, somewhat hopeful day in the life of a shounen manga editor.

On the train, he checks his phone, since that’s what most of the commuters around him are doing, save the fortunate few reading beat up books. 

Immediately, his inbox is flooded with vitriolic emails, all from the dreaded mangaka outlining his plans for annihilation. Keiji ignores these tirades in favour of new assignments and, of course, anticipatory outlines regarding his upcoming speech.

For the rest of the day, Keiji avoids the outlines to the detriment of the rapport he’s developed with Ogata, his boss. 

Multiple times, Ogata approaches him from behind as Keiji is fielding two calls at his desk, one from a young man barely making ends meet with two jobs, let alone through manga, and one from a formerly beloved mangaka whose more recent publication has consistently disappointed his readership.

Both calls go on for upwards of two hours, and each time Ogata meanders over to Keiji’s desk, he bends over to give him an uncompromising stare, as though such sincerity wasn’t part of the job description. 

Keiji finally ends both calls, neither of them resolved with any amount of hope, sighing. Unnervingly, his breathing speeds up. He’s been sitting for too long again. Standing, he stretches both arms over his head. Yawning, he flinches when he’s reminded of Ogata standing over his desk, the same off white Uniqlo sweater he wears every day grating on Keiji’s nerves.

“You’ve read the terms, haven’t you?” Ogata says.

“Of course, Ogata-san.”

“Don’t read them without replying next time.”

“Yes, Ogata-san.”

“Good. Thank you for your hard work.”

Alone again, Keiji revisits his sources on various mangaka exposing the harm scanlations inflict on the manga industry. Not many mangaka are Horikoshi. Most are like the young man Keiji remembers as he reads the depressing truths; even while working two jobs and writing manga on the side, the young man had said he’d rather throw his dream in the garbage if no one was going to spend their money on his work. 

“No one understands manga is a luxury,” he’d said.

His words leaden Keiji’s stomach. On the side of his right hand, he pens down the young man’s number with a sharpie.

Around one in the afternoon, Koutarou sends him a picture of the Monster energy drink he’d packed with a reminder for Keiji to “not forget to eat!!!!!”

Begrudgingly, Keiji boards the elevator ushering him out of his claustrophobic workspace and into the vast, translucent concourse of his building. 

Nowadays, Kenma is the only friend he meets with any amount of regularity.

During the brief window of time between calls, Keiji meets him at the McDonald’s near Aoyama Book Center. It’s not Keiji’s restaurant of choice, but it’s cheaper and quicker than any other spot in their area.

“Tetsurou wasn’t much help,” Kenma says, crinkling the tinfoil wrapping of his Big Mac with both hands.

Keiji grunts in affirmation. “He thinks the rest of us can handle befriending strangers with the comfort and ease he wields like some sort of effortless magic.”

“Yeah, and yet he’s cautious when  _ I  _ go out into the world.”

On some level, Keiji understands Tetsurou’s instinctive need to guide Kenma through social ordeals like work parties and gatherings built around shared hobbies. Since childhood, Tetsurou’s navigated the pathway to friendships alongside Kenma; when their shared pathway had broadened into spending the rest of their lives together, none of that had changed. 

“That aside,” Kenma says, probably coming to the same conclusion in his head, “maybe talk to Bokuto?”

_ Before adulthood stole their lives, they’d spent hours enjoying the ordinary joys found in apartment living.  _

_ Initially, it was Keiji who had championed Koutarou to apply for his current job as a spokesperson for their local queer support group. He would advocate for greater representation in their local media outlets and for broader perspectives on queer Japanese life in America. _

_ Naturally, the call to bring Koutarou on board had come within one week of them sending out the application.  _

_ After that, Keiji only ever saw him when he was half-asleep, about to pass out over heaps of paperwork, or in the painful hours of the morning, shrouded by an imitation of moonlight.  _

The following evening, Koutarou’s work event is called off due to a troubling illness afflicting the host. 

He surprises Keiji into stuttering fits, himself trapped on the threshold of their apartment, convinced that his sleeplessness has come for his soul, damning him to a hell filled with mirages of Koutarou, forever out of reach.

“You’re home!” Koutarou says.

Keiji can’t believe he’s hearing Koutarou speak to him in person, not through some shitty speaker. He clamps his right hand against his mouth, sucking hard on his palm.

“Keiji?”

Koutarou’s grown blurry through a film of tears. Shaking his head, Keiji stumbles over the threshold before collapsing into Koutarou’s outspread arms.

He says, “Do you want to hear me give a speech?”

His entire body tenses with a feverish ecstasy as the firm bulk of Koutarou’s right arm slides along the tight fissure of his ass.

“Always.”

Later, in bed, they make love for the first time in months.

He catches the beams of joy radiating from Koutarou’s smile the entire time he’s speaking. None of Keiji’s work friends are prepared to welcome this loud, loving and loyal team member into their group, but Koutarou appreciates their honesty nonetheless.

In minutes, Ogata sends Keiji an enthusiastic follow up on his speech. 

An hour later, the entire department receives a thorough explanation on the removal of a promising talent from the  _Jump_ lineup. 

Before leaving work, Ogata has to stop Keiji from being overly polite, the amount of bowing and outward displaying of gratitude approaching the obscene.

Next is onigiri at his favourite stand. 

He responds to Koutarou’s message in seconds:  _See you soon_.

**Author's Note:**

> *The New York Times


End file.
